


Show My Teeth But Never Bite

by wancestroll (vaassassins)



Series: Hide And Seek [1]
Category: Formula 1 RPF, Formula 2 RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drabble, Lando Norris DNI, No Plot, Platonic Cuddling, Platonic Hand Holding, Platonic Relationships, Swearing, daniel being a wolf boy howling and shit, its raining, just very platonic, nurburgring 2020, ted is mentioned!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-18
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:41:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,187
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28145547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vaassassins/pseuds/wancestroll
Summary: The boys play hide and seek instead of moping around their garages when fp1 and fp2 are cancelled at nurburgring.
Relationships: Alexander Albon/George Russell, Callum Ilott/Mick Schumacher, Esteban Ocon/Lance Stroll, Lando Norris/Carlos Sainz Jr
Series: Hide And Seek [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2061858
Comments: 6
Kudos: 55





	Show My Teeth But Never Bite

**Author's Note:**

> the title is from "All Your Love" by Sir Sly
> 
> ofc keep this away from the drivers, please!!!

Their schedules became painfully bare on race weekends. Besides signing thousands of merch items, there was too much time. They spent most of it sitting about. Now, they lounged in one of the hauntingly empty rooms above the garages between first and second practice. 

Esteban’s face lit up. “What if we play hide and seek?” 

“It sounds ridiculous, but at this point I’m willing to try anything,” Callum drawled. 

Daniel started his countdown from thirty. He stood in the center of the nearly empty paddock with his hands over his eyes, and he didn’t peek. He wasn’t a monster. He respected the rules of hide and seek. He listened to feet splashing against the wet asphalt in all different directions — down opposite ends of the paddock, through the garage, behind the motor homes. He didn’t hear much else. For the most part, it was him all by himself, everyone else inside. After thirty seconds passed, Daniel uncovered his eyes and immediately started sprinting, sporting a menacing grin.

\--

“Ay! Scoot! This is _our_ spot, cabrón,” Carlos protested. But he didn’t wait. He simply crawled over Lando, making sure to be as obnoxious as possible as he maneuvered without any of the elegance an athlete should. 

They sat like that, between the stools at the pit wall, beneath the computers which held those cursed forecast maps. Every so often, Lando’s fingers moved in a blur of taps and whistles across his phone screen. Carlos would fidget at the quiet noises. He definitely had a little too much adrenaline for a game. Carlos would hiss every time Lando actually giggled at something on twitter. If he was going to play hide and seek like a child, he would at least do it well. 

Carlos nudged Lando who looked up from his phone to where Carlos pointed subtly. Daniel was weaving between the rare mechanic or reporter or rubber ducky photoshoot. His head turned back and forth and back and forth. Unfortunately, Daniel’s line of sight narrowed in on the McLaren boys, and Daniel started pointing back, more overtly than Carlos. 

“Dios mio,” Carlos muttered. Daniel’s face looked a little dangerous, and Carlos would deny anything Lando said, but he flinched at those wide hungry eyes, and that intimidating grin. Lando got out first. He stretched his legs forward and propelled feet first into a puddle. He turned back to Carlos with a grin and a shrug and pulled Carlos back out too. 

\--

Alex’s head popped up. “Did you hear that?” he wondered out loud with no small amount of nervousness. He looked around, the corner of the Williams motor home towards that horrifying howling sound. Like a wolf. It didn’t mean anything good for himself or George if Daniel added a new sound to his repertoire during the middle of this. 

“Don’t worry mate, it’s only a game,” George said reassuringly in that voice. 

“It’s not just a game. That noise is something else,” Alex insisted.

“Really, it’s fine. We can’t do anything but wait to be found,” George rationalized. Then he reached for Alex’s hand and held it, and Alex decided he didn’t need any rational thoughts. Rational thoughts are for losers who don’t have friends as nice as George. Then-

“HERE’S DANIEL!” 

“AAAAAAAH!!!!!!” George and Alex both stumped backwards and tripped, falling on their asses. Daniel towered over them with his arms above his head and his fingers stretched and pointed as if he was a Daniel-sized honey badger. George had his eyes closed and his head turned away. He batted his arms toward the threat blindly, and Alex sat there, pouting with his arms crossed. _Just a fucking game_. His ass was getting wet. He let Daniel pull him up, and dust off his suit in a worthless effort. Alex pulled George up himself. 

“See, alright mate,” Alex grumbled. When they looked back, Daniel was gone. All that was left of him was the disappearing sound of his feet and the damp spots on the backs of their race suits. 

\--

Lance and Esteban had casual definitions of “hide”. Even though it was Esteban's idea to play this game, he wanted Lance to be comfortable. He agreed to camp in front of the heater where they sat and snuggled. They shamelessly hogged the narrow stream of hot air. Nobody was there in the garage. It was just them, neatly stacked tires, and Lance’s RP20. They waited patiently for their comfortable silence to reach a rude and abrupt end, shuddering each time they heard howls and screams bubble up from around the paddock. 

They sat quietly. This gentle habit of familiar silence that comforted like a groaning heater on a rainy day. Just outside the garage, rain dripped from the roof onto the watery paddock. Esteban’s hands itched to drive in the rain; his forte. Lance could take it or leave it, but it was always nice to cuddle. 

A patch of blue grows and grows, even as it moves further away from them. Other than that, it's a grey hell. Dark grey skies, dark grey concrete, dark grey auras, if Lance learned anything from internet astrologists. It wasn’t green as he’d been promised. Even the racing point garage was still bathed in bubblegum pink. This? Lance could leave this. 

But he can’t control the passage of time, so he waits. Waits for the sun to come out, waits for pink to turn green, waits for auras to turn bright and shiny like they were before all of this, waits for Daniel to ruin the comfortable vibe he has with Esteban, and hope that it would be an isolated occurrence. 

Daniel fulfilled the prophecy, by sprinting into the garage from the back of the paddock. More howling. He ruffled Esteban’s carefully styled hair, and then cackled, as Esteban tried to fix it without a mirror. Lance fixed a couple of the strands, pointedly ignoring Daniel who ignored him right back. Until he turned to Lance and smiled politely. It was tame. Lance waved, but he didn’t return the smile. 

“See you later, boys!” Daniel cheerily. Then he walked out the way he came. 

\--

Mick and Callum followed Ted onto the roof. This was certainly an employee work hazard, but so was driving cars at 200 miles per hour. With that logic, they climbed up the slick rungs of the ladder. Ted was on the far side of the roof by the edge above the pit lane. He had a hand to his ear, and he listened through those absurd headphones to some direction from a producer, before turning to the camera and staring down the lens. He put the classic blue microphone to his face, and started reporting about the helicopter’s field of view. 

Mick led Callum around some chimneys. The flat roof collected rain in puddles, before seeping off the roof to the pit lane below. Mick bent down to sit, while Callum led against the wall. They stayed like that until free practice ended, and the sun broke through the clouds. It was ironic. Maybe they hid too well, but nobody said the roof was off limits.


End file.
